A relative of mine is an engineer at an electric plant. Last Christmas I asked him what was happening at his company with y2k. He immediately laughed and said, "Do you want to know the company line or what they are doing?" I said tell me what the company is doing. He said they were not doing much but he had been called and asked if he might have any problem areas. He said he had mentioned a few. He also said some of the guys had been talking around the coffee table and the subject of embedded systems came up. One fellow said he wondered if anyone was doing anything about that. They decided they should call someone and have them do some checking. The relative said they had a whole year and he was sure they would be fine. That was last Christmas.

I saw the brother of this engineer last week. The engineer has been working 7 days a week for the last several months. The brother said he asked the engineer last week about their y2k status. He said the engineer immediately became angry and defensive and said, "Don't ever mention that to me again! I don't want to talk about it!"

The engineer brother is a mild mannered fellow. Have never heard him raise his voice or be angry about anything. This is especially true about his brothers and sisters and his Mom. In other words, this is out of character for him. The brother who asked him the question has decided he had better store some water and food.

I believe that his 7 day work week for the last several months and continuing at this time is y2k related and he is frustrated and concerned. I think he is not allowed to speak about it now but I know him well enough to know he will tell his family if he feels there is a likelihood of loss of power after December.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 1999

Answers

Marcella,

I can sympathise with what your relative might be going through. We had a short period like that near the end of our testing. Can you tell us what type of power plant he is working on (ie nuke, fossil fueled etc), and either the company name or the aproximate location.

Malcolm.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 1999

Very large company, this plant fossil fuel, a southern state.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 1999

Remember last year about this time, when everyone was saying that they would be ready by 31 Dec 98, with 1 year left for testing, the first coal fired plant blew up, then in quick succession 5 more blew up in the next few months, then they stopped blowing up.

Personally, though I have no proof, I figure that they stopped testing for y2k. If anyone knows something more or better, please advise.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 1999

Macella, I really believe that it is wrong to just assume all that you are assuming. I know engineers that get angry about this since to them y2k was more of a political issue to them than a technical issue, the problems were so minor, yet got priority over other critical problems. Why not take a chance and ask the man?

Regards,

-- Anonymous, December 04, 1999